Overview

John H. Schroeder chronicles the expansion of the American Navy's peacetime role in developing the nation's overseas commercial empire during the thirty years before the Civil War. He demonstrates how the rapid acceleration of American commercial activity around the world increased pressure on the Navy to meet new economic and political demands. He analyzes how the Navy's haphazard development in the antebellum years paralleled and interacted with commercial activity, and how the end result impacted dramatically on the economic development of the United States.

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9780313248832

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?Aggressive American overseas commercial expansion is usually identified with the last half of the 19th century, but in this pathbreaking study Schroeder shows that the movement predated the Civil War by two decades. The peacetime role of the navy in antebellum America was consistently defined as the ""protection of commerce,"" but the activities of the navy in fulfilling this role grew from combating pirates, policing smuggling, and performing diplomatic tasks. These included exploring distant regions (especially around the Pacific Ocean), establishing trade relations with new areas (such as Perry's opening of Japan), and producing wind, current, and even whale census charts. Naval officers applauded the expansion of their role and the increase in the size of the navy that accompanied it, but the impetus for change came from the whaling and shipping industries, politicians, and other civilian sources. An important work certain to influence interpretations of 19th-century diplomatic, economic, and naval history. Public and academic libraries, community college level and up.?-CHOICE ""Aggressive American overseas commercial expansion is usually identified with the last half of the 19th century, but in this pathbreaking study Schroeder shows that the movement predated the Civil War by two decades. The peacetime role of the navy in antebellum America was consistently defined as the ""protection of commerce,"" but the activities of the navy in fulfilling this role grew from combating pirates, policing smuggling, and performing diplomatic tasks. These included exploring distant regions (especially around the Pacific Ocean), establishing trade relations with new areas (such as Perry's opening of Japan), and producing wind, current, and even whale census charts. Naval officers applauded the expansion of their role and the increase in the size of the navy that accompanied it, but the impetus for change came from the whaling and shipping industries, politicians, and other civilian sources. An important work certain to influence interpretations of 19th-century diplomatic, economic, and naval history. Public and academic libraries, community college level and up.""-CHOICE

?Aggressive American overseas commercial expansion is usually identified with the last half of the 19th century, but in this pathbreaking study Schroeder shows that the movement predated the Civil War by two decades. The peacetime role of the navy in antebellum America was consistently defined as the protection of commerce, but the activities of the navy in fulfilling this role grew from combating pirates, policing smuggling, and performing diplomatic tasks. These included exploring distant regions (especially around the Pacific Ocean), establishing trade relations with new areas (such as Perry's opening of Japan), and producing wind, current, and even whale census charts. Naval officers applauded the expansion of their role and the increase in the size of the navy that accompanied it, but the impetus for change came from the whaling and shipping industries, politicians, and other civilian sources. An important work certain to influence interpretations of 19th-century diplomatic, economic, and naval history. Public and academic libraries, community college level and up.?-CHOICE

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hroeder /f John /i H.

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